Dangerous Woman: The Graphic Biography of Emma Goldman [Paperback]

Sharon Rudahl (Author), Paul Buhle (Editor), Alice Wexler (Foreword)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 30, 2007

The anarchist and radical hero Emma Goldman, brought to vivid life in a graphic biography by an acclaimed artist.

"You are a terrible child and will grow into a worse woman! You have no respect for your elders or for authority! You will surely end on the gallows as a public menace!"—Emma Goldman's childhood religion teacher

A wonderful retelling of the famous anarchist and radical icon Emma Goldman's extraordinary life, this graphic biography embodies the richness and drama of Goldman's story in a wholly original way.

A Dangerous Woman depicts the full sweep of a life lived to the hilt in the struggle for equality and justice. Emma Goldman was at the forefront of the radical causes of the twentieth century, from leading hunger demonstrations during the Great Depression—"Ask for work! If they do not give you work, ask for bread! If they do not give you work or bread, take the bread!"—to organizing a cloakmakers' strike, from lecturing on how to use birth control to fighting conscription for World War I, while her soulmate, Alexander Berkman, spent fourteen years in jail for his failed attentat against industrialist Henry Clay Frick.

Sharon Rudahl's lovely, energetic illustrations bring Goldman's many facets and passions to new life; her work belongs with the critically acclaimed graphic nonfiction of Alison Bechdel's Fun Home and Marjane Satrapi's Persepolis. Featuring a foreword by Alice Wexler, A Dangerous Woman is a marvelously compelling presentation of a woman devoted to revolutionizing her age.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Deploying the smack-'em-in-the-face descriptive style of Will Eisner for a graphic biography may not seem like the best idea. But when it comes to the life of famed anarchist Emma Goldman, Rudahl's punchy, exclamation point-heavy method feels just right to cover the crusader's life. Born in Russia in 1869 at a time when women, particularly Jewish women, were to be downtrodden and not heard, Goldman lost no time upsetting the status quo with her big mouth and restless curiosity. After following her sisters to America, the newly married Goldman was just starting to learn about leftist politics when she became radicalized by the 1886 Haymarket bombing in Chicago, leading to more than a half-century's worth of nearly nonstop protesting, fiery speechmaking and organizing across North America and Europe, and even a few passionate affairs. Rudahl's earnest admiration for Goldman and her refreshingly smart approach to the cause is clear in her excited artwork, all cramped frames and twirly action. The volume is well-suited for libraries because of its knowledgeable but shorthand approach to history, exemplified in a scene where Teddy Roosevelt holds a copy of Upton Sinclair's The Jungle and declares, I don't want fingers in my sausage!!! Hurry up and pass some food and drug laws! (Sept.)
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About the Author

Sharon Rudahl's work has appeared in underground newspapers and magazines, Marvel Comics, and Wobblies!: A Graphic History; her art has been widely exhibited. She lives in Hollywood. Paul Buhle is a senior lecturer at Brown University. He has written, edited, or co-edited thirty-two books, including the Encyclopedia of the American Left, Wobblies!, and the Jews and American Popular Culture trilogy. Alice Wexler is the author of a two-volume biography of Emma Goldman. She is a research scholar at UCLA.

Product Details

• Paperback: 115 pages
• Publisher: New Press, The (September 30, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1595580646
• ISBN-13: 978-1595580641
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 0.3 x 10 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.6 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #690,816 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Real life Superhero November 23, 2007

By James Generic

Format:Paperback

Emma Goldman is one of the big name names of American anarchists, as well as one of the earlier to contribute to free speech, birth control, and the labor movements. She was an amazing public speaker, something that is lost in this day of television and radio, and her writing still ranks amongst the classics of Anarchist thought for a free and just society. From her involvement in the shooting of Frick (though Alexander Berkman was a lousy shot) to free speech fights to labor struggles in Massachusetts to getting deported by Edgar Hoover, all the way to being amongst the first radicals to denounce the government of the Bolsheviks (which ostracized her amongst the left), and finally working to raise funds for the Spanish Revolutionary cause. She was jailed for fighting against the draft, advocating for birth control, and for "inciting a riot." In a lot of ways, the stuff she said then was visionary for the time period. She remains one of the most amazing people in history, and someone who gave her all so others could be free and live in a just world.

"Dangerous Woman: A Graphic Biography of Emma Goldman" can be best described as a graphic novel version of "Living My Life", and it's a real treat. The artist, Sharon Rudahl, does a great job capturing Goldman's turbulent and unique life, growing from a fiery Jewish peasant girl fleeing Russia to an active Anarchist speaker and organizer hated by the government, to the patron-saint of the American Anarchist movement, though small by the time of her death. She spares no detail, especially the parts about Emma's sex life and her many partners over the years. One of my favorite scenes in the book is when she has been sent by her mentor, Johann Most, on a speaking tour "Against the 8 Hour Day" (it was too little and was too reformist and not revolutionary enough.) She encounters an older man in the Chicago stop of the tour who tells her that while he understands why young people would be impatient with small demands, but "I won't live to see the revolution. Will I never have a little time for reading or to walk openly in the park?" After this encounter, Emma vowed never to let doctrine or ideology get in the way of a good fight that brought real change to real people's lives. That's a lesson that a lot of radicals then and now could learn and take to heart.
Today, the closest we in the United States have to an Emma Goldman is academics in ivory towers, as loud mouth voices in the sea of state and corporate rule. The speaking tours of yesterday is the youtube, internet, music albums and television of today, which is much more controlled than speaking in public used to be, though less prone to violent disruption by people who disagree with the author. It's hard to imagine a story like hers again where someone from such a humble beginning devotes her entire life, to the point where she refused to correct health problems like infertility, to the cause of fighting the existing order, and becoming such an international figure as she did. Maybe a new Emma Goldman of the internet or TV or music like hiphop will arise to become an inspiration to people's movements everywhere, like Subcommader Marcos in Chiapas has, or elsewhere. It's hard to say. Either way, check out Emma's life in graphic novel comic form, because she's a real life superhero in a way that Superman never could be.

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Passionate Advocacy of A Passionate Advocate October 3, 2007

By bckm

Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase

Sharon Rudahl's "A Dangerous Woman" covers the life of a well-known anarchist around the turn of the century. Sharon's art is very appropriate for a fiery speechmaker; the plot as presented by Sharon never drags, and you get a book and a movie at the same time!

I had heard about Emma Goldman, but my political youth was spent in the socialist movement, not the anarchist movement, so I never researched Ms. Goldman's life or work. One piece I found interesting was Ms. Goldman's opposition to the amendment granting women the right to vote, and why she opposed it. Since my grandmother was a prominent suffragette, I approached this part of the book with some skepticism, but it was presented with such passion that I found myself agreeing in principle with some parts of Ms. Goldman's philosopy on this particular topic. Of course, hindsight is always 20/20, and it's difficult to go back in time to try to understand things with the perspective in effect at that time, but Ms. Rudahl does a fantastic job with her art of helping to build that paradigm.

I found it difficult to put the book down, it was so entertaining, and in a way that enlightens. Emma Goldman didn't live her life as an audition for a reality show, so you probably won't get that kind of stilted melodrama from it. What you WILL get is a fascinating historical presentation with Ms. Rudahl's art, and a dialog that both complements the art and creates it's own story.

A very fine book, and I heartily recommend buying it.

2 of 3 people found the following review helpful

2.0 out of 5 stars Acceptable for high school students January 6, 2010

By Jennifer E. Bruenger

Format:Paperback

Rudahl's descriptive expository approach to Emma's story did not work for me; it seems her aim for this graphic biography was creation for the benefit of instruction--to teach the youth of today, which is perfectly fine. But to me the approach set a forced tone. I feel this could have been so much better had Rudahl taken another approach (e.g. telling the story from Emma directly or from the memory of Alexandar Berkman or niece Stella or from police files).

The art--I like how Rudahl uses a variety of different frames and image montages, and the composition of her work is very good--movement, balance, and perspective. However, I am not keen about her style, especially her inability to convey expression in characters' faces. Over and over the same wooden image of Emma Goldman. Characterizations of people, graphically-speaking are flat; the images of people often reminded me of manikins.

If you want to learn about Emma Goldman, I suggest reading her story in her own words, Living My Life, volumes 1&2